1995 Volume 39 Issue 1 Pages 19-26
Guided bone regeneration (GBR) technique has been used widely with dental implants, however, the technique is still not fully established. Particularly, in humans, the minimum time to regenerate bone defects covered with a barrier membrane is still unknown. The purpose of this clinical study was to evaluate regenerated bone maturation with long-term indwelling of Gore-Tex® membrane using X-ray CT imaging as well as conventional diagnostic means. A patient was a 25-year-old woman who had completely a fractured upper right central incisor caused by an accident. She accepted the treatment plan which included GBR and dental implant restoration. After membrane indwelling for five and 11 months, X-ray CT was taken under the same condition and subjected to image processing. The processed X-ray CT image clearly showed that the bone defect was still present even after ll-month membrane indwelling however, we clinically confirmed that solid bone-like tissue existed beneath the membrane. After the membrane was removed, ITI implant was placed and successfully functioned for over one year. It is suggested that the 11-month membrane indwelling period is clinically sufficient for bone maturation but not pathologically sufficient. Further investigation should be conducted to determine of the minimum time of membrane indwelling and develope a method for acceleration of regenerated bone maturation.
